


He Is Negan

by TheFightingBull



Series: We Are Winchesters [1]
Category: Supernatural, The Walking Dead (TV)
Genre: Dean is 14, Family Feels, Gen, Good Parent John Winchester, Negan Being Negan (Walking Dead), Negan is an automatic warning (Walking Dead), Not Beta Read, Protective Negan (Walking Dead), Sam is 10, Teacher Negan (Walking Dead), language warning, seriously
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-13
Updated: 2020-07-13
Packaged: 2021-03-05 03:21:56
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,955
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25237654
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheFightingBull/pseuds/TheFightingBull
Summary: John knows its time for the hunt of his life, but Dean and especially Sam are too young. He needs help with this hunt and he knows Bobby and Jim have his back, but who can watch his boys? What if he doesn't make it out? He knows it's been years since he last spoke with his older brother, but it doesn't change anything. Not really. Mad, psychotic, bitter? His big brother will always have his back. All he has to do is call him.(Part 1 of this Series was for a Trope Thursday Challenge. The prompt? Supernatural AU. What can be more supernatural than zombies and the show Supernatural?)
Relationships: John Winchester & Negan
Series: We Are Winchesters [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1828288
Comments: 3
Kudos: 32





	He Is Negan

A name flashed across the tiny black screen of his flip phone. It vibrated as he read the information displayed. He hadn’t seen that name in years. At least not since before the incident. If he answered, he imagined he’d hear a voice he hadn’t in years. The question was, did he _want_ to hear that voice again? Was he ready to hear whatever _they_ had to say? It wasn’t like things ended magnanimously.

How long had it been? Almost fifteen years if his count wasn’t off.

His phone stopped buzzing and the name disappeared. He ashed his cigarette and looked back down at his map, only for the phone to begin vibrating again. He side-eyed the phone, as if it were a disobedient child that had ignored a direct order.

He snapped the phone open and pressed it to his hear. “Johnny Boy, what in the Hell are you doing calling _me_?” He allowed him to speak as he listened closely. “I see. Well, I’d give you a big fat warm welcome to the fucking club, but—” he cut himself off and listened to the angry voice on the other side of the connection. He winced at the new information but didn’t apologize. “That so? Two? Well, sincerely, congratu-fucking-lations on the latter and as for the former…” he didn’t know what to say, but he didn’t appreciate the barked insults on the other end either. “Well, fuck me, Johnny! You waited how many damned years to tell me you were even married! What do you want me to say? Fuckin’ sucks for her?”

He laughed heartily as listened to the angry threats that spilled into his ear. He really should have been a touch more sensitive. When the man settled down and allowed him a chance to speak, he couldn’t drop his grin. “You just tell me where you are. I can’t _wait_ to meet ‘em.”

* * *

Dean Winchester stared up at his father as the man locked down the small two-bedroom apartment. His dad already salted everything, but that didn’t seem to be enough. For some reason he was adding garlic to the mix. Was Dad afraid of Vampires? He was pretty sure he’d heard Bobby Singer say that they were extinct. Maybe it was for something else.

A loud, rhythmic knocking came from the front door and Dean swallowed.

“What’s going on Dad?” Dean finally asked as he noted that John had yet to stop what he was doing to answer the door.

Dean knew better than to do it for him. John Winchester had very strict rules when it came to him or his brother opening the door or picking up the telephone. The main one being don’t do it, unless Dad told them to. It rubbed Dean the wrong way the older he got. He was fourteen for crying out loud! He was practically an adult.

The knock got louder as it repeated the same rhythm. Dean was sure it was familiar, but he couldn’t quite place it. He thought it might have been in a cartoon or two. Or maybe it was just from the one he and Sammy had watched recently? Who Framed Roger Rabbit? Yes! Shave and A Haircut, Two Bits!

“Dad?”

“Yeah I know, Dean,” John sighed before barking out his orders. “Go get your brother and sit down on the couch. Now.”

“Yes, Sir,” he answered immediately and ran off to grab his brother.

Sam, or Sammy to him and Dad, Winchester had last been coloring or studying or doing something dorky shortly after dinner. Because of that he wasn’t surprised when he found the ten-year-old, nose stuck in a book, laying out across his stomach on the bottom bunk. _Dean’s_ bunk. He wanted to roll his eyes and bitch about it, but he was getting a little big to care all that much about Sam using his stuff.

“Dad wants us on the couch,” Dean explained.

“Just a sec,” Sammy glared without looking up.

“ _Now_ , Sam,” Dean said in his severest tone.

He didn’t know why Sam had to fight him on everything lately! Not only was Dean the oldest, but Sam had to know he was just going to yank the book away if he didn’t do as he’d asked. Besides, neither one of them wanted their dad coming to get them. It was for the sake of their bottoms that Sammy do as Dean asked the first time, rather than wait for John to come in and issue a command for the _second_ time.

As Dean moved forward to take the book away, they each heard the door open and a loud, obnoxious whistle split the air. The laughter that followed was taunting but sounded identical to their dad’s. Well, if their dad ever bothered to laugh anymore.

Sam glanced up at him in question, but all Dean could do was shrug and head out to the living room to find out who it was.

“Holy shit, look at you, Johnny!” Still dad’s voice, but not at all Dad’s style. “Looking just as surly and ugly as a witch’s green pussy!”

When Dean walked into the living area, Sammy right behind him, he saw their Dad glaring sternly at a man who looked a lot like John. Their dad was a strong, powerful man in terms of height and weight, but while the older version of their father was the same height, he was a lot leaner. Especially in the face.

Where John’s hair was a little long and fell about his head in soft black curls, the others was somewhat slicked back with only a few curls peeking through the style. Their dad’s face had some black scruff n’ stubble, but the look-a-like had a lot more salt than pepper in his facial hair and a large white smile plastered across his face. John Winchester rarely, if ever, smiled anymore.

“First off, it’s John, you know that. Second, you watch your damned mouth around my boys, Negan, or I’ll knock your teeth out,” John snarled before turning his attention on Dean and his brother. “Couch, _now_. Don’t _make_ me tell you again.”

Dean dragged Sammy to the couch and promptly took a seat. They looked to their father for some kind of explanation, but the louder version of their father, Negan apparently, was already moving to step before them. Even after the threat his smile never faltered.

“Look at how _adorable_ you two are!” Negan proclaimed as he dropped to a crouch in front of them. “You sure they’re yours Johnny? No way in Hell you could give birth to such cute kids. Not with that ugly mug of yours.”

“We practically share the same face, asshole,” John snapped.

Dean couldn’t help but snicker at the men’s banter. He’d found swear words pretty funny for most of his life and at fourteen, he didn’t think that would ever change. Sam however looked just as irritated as their father had when the man came in and talked dirty.

“Boys, this is my older brother Negan,” John said, his voice filled with irritation and maybe a little exhaustion. “Negan that’s my oldest Dean, he’s fourteen, and my youngest Sammy, he’s ten.”

“Sam!” his brother whined.

“You sound just like your Daddy, Sam,” Negan laughed as he got back to his feet. “I was the only one allowed to get away with calling him Johnny, but mostly because, no matter how much he claimed he’d kick my ass, we both knew he couldn’t.”

Dean glanced at his father and caught John rolling his eyes.

“I’m already regretting this,” John said with a heavy sigh.

“Oh, now, now baby brother. We haven’t even gotten to the good stuff yet,” Negan snickered. “I’m _dying_ to hear all about your introduction to the world of Bat-Shit Crazy!”

“I don’t know why I thought I could ask this of you,” John sneered, and his I’ve-never-been-so-disappointed-in-you tone was recognized as easily by Sam as himself. They each squirmed in their seats as John stepped up to Negan. “I don’t know how or why you’ve become _whatever_ this is, but I’m not exposing my boys to your ego _or_ insanity.”

“Don’t your turn your back on me, John Winchester, or I swear I’ll beat your ass right here for your boys to see,” Negan warned. “You don’t _get_ to put me down, John. Not after _I_ was the one proven right. Not after you and Mom pushed _me_ away!”

Before they started up again, Dean stood up and took Sammy’s hand. “We shouldn’t be here while you guys are trying to talk. We’ll go to our room and play, okay?”

Neither man argued, with him _or_ each other, as Dean ushered his brother out of the room and back to their bedroom.

* * *

John loved his big brother. He always had. He’d looked up to Negan because he was the most charismatic, funny, and protective man known to him. Even if they were only five years apart, Henry had bailed on their family, and that left Negan the man of the house. His big brother had done a fine job of it, too considering how big of a pain in the ass John knew he’d been.

Negan joined the Marines the moment he was old enough, but when he came back, he was different. John’s big brother would rant and rave about all kinds of unnatural things. He’d line their windows with salt and keep ‘weapons’ hidden everywhere. If it wasn’t a gun, he wanted whatever it was to be iron. Negan even started attending church, but then would come home with so-called Angel weapons. He even melted one down at local shop and created barbed wire out of it before wrapping said barbed wire around his favorite wooden baseball bat.

He took that bat with him everywhere from that point forward. It had been embarrassing to John and his mother, but Negan didn’t worry. He just grinned, winked, and talked. Still himself in essentials, just a little more bizarre and lot more frightening, it wasn’t difficult for Negan Winchester to charm people into thinking he wasn’t _that_ bad of a guy.

At one point their mother became convinced he was possessed and in need of an exorcism. She called in in her priest and after several hours, Father Gabriel Stokes decided Negan didn’t really need any ritual to save his soul. John was terrified that his family was about to split apart when his mother cried and locked herself in her room at the news. When he told his brother about it, Negan had laughed it off and gone to bed.

The next morning though, he was gone.

Every six months or so, John and his mom would each receive a postcard with a phone number and a quick line. Usually something sweet to their mother, and to John, something so filthy and vulgar that he never shared them with anyone else.

At one point he wrote about marrying a woman named Lucille out in Virginia. The post cards hadn’t changed states since. Six years or so later, John got the postcard telling him she died. Ovarian cancer. No information about a funeral or how to attend. It was clear to John that he and his mother weren’t wanted. They were the only two postcards John received that didn’t include a dirty joke.

Then their mom died of influenza that turned into pneumonia. It was quick, sudden, and certainly unexpected. Negan came back for the funeral. He’d approached John and took him aside where no one could hear. He was so sure that Negan would come back home after losing his own wife a year prior, but that wasn’t the case.

He said he just wanted to leave him with some comfort and some instructions.

 _“Don’t worry, our mother was too sweet to ever leave anything of herself behind, but me? Oh many, Johnny. I can’t imagine what I’d leave here on Earth. Baby brother, you **promise** me that when my time comes, when I die, you burn me to ash. You hear me? To fucking ash. Same with everything I own or **have** owned. All of it. Burn me and all my shit until nothing is left. Do you understand me?” _

So as John stared at him in his small two-bedroom, one bath apartment, he was devastated to see that nothing had really changed. Even if Negan had been right about it all, how could he trust this man with his boys? Brother or not, John would never forgive Negan if anything happened to them. He’d never forgive himself either.

“Look at me, Johnny,” Negan ordered as he approached, his voice quiet but commanding all the same. “I want to hear your story, brother and I know damned well you want to hear mine, but you have a hunt. You need someone to protect your boys.”

John nodded.

“You may think the worst of me and my temper, my mouth… Hell you’ve never liked my fuckin’ style very much either, but that’s okay, John. That’s okay,” Negan grinned. “Those things you don’t like won’t stop me from taking a life for your boys, will they? That shit that your pretty head is so fucking offended by? It won’t prevent me from fucking up any man, woman, or creature that tries to do them harm.”

He couldn’t help but hesitate as he stared at his older brother.

“Tell me something, John, and you be honest,” Negan started. “When have I _ever_ failed to protect you or Mom?”

“Never,” John sighed, feeling more and more confident in his decision to reach out. “You’d better be willing to tell me your story, Negan. Or you won’t hear a damned thing from me.”

“Now that’s what I’m talking about,” Negan grinned and pulled him into a side-armed hug. “Negan and Johnny, together again. You go kill those vampires, witches and demons, oh my! And I’ll keep the rugrats alive, in school, and training. I mean, you _do_ train them, right?”

John rolled his eyes and stepped away from his brother. “Of course, I do.” He started to head back to the room to talk to his boys but thinking of them reminded him of something else he wanted Negan to know about. “Sam loves school, so you won’t have any issues there, but Dean is rebelling hard.”

Negan raised a brow and then scowled at him. “How _long_ you been living this shit life, John?”

There was a threat in his older brother’s eyes. A warning not to lie. Recalling the way his brother handled things if he discovered John had lied in the past, he dropped his shoulders. It was better to be honest and hurt the man’s feelings than to lie to him and face his wrath. Not that Negan would ever admit to his feelings being hurt. John was pretty sure his brother would sooner admit to making out with that cop to avoid a ticket than tell John he was hurting.

“Mary died when Sam wasn’t even a year old,” John answered and decided to regale his brother with the tale. It wasn’t a long one and he’d rather get it done and over with. “I went upstairs after hearing Mary scream and I got into Sammy’s nursery and she was pinned to the ceiling. Everything in the room, including Mary caught fire. Sam, Dean and I got out.”

His brother inhaled sharply. “How the fuck did you find out about Azazel?”

“Went to a psychic.” 

Negan leaned back a little and shook his head. “Let me see if I got this shit down. You’ve been hunting for ten damned years and you went to some crystal ball worshipping, tarot card reading whore to get answers?” John nodded because there wasn’t much else he could say. “You reach out to fucking strangers, but this is the first time I’m hearing anything from you?” Negan said with a sneer. “Fuck you, John. Fuck you.”

He was tempted to defend himself, to make his brother see why he hadn’t come to him right away, but when Negan decided to be pissed, there was no changing his mind. His older brother was as merciless and unforgiving as any man, woman, or creature John had ever met. He was also unbelievably selfish, usually at the worst moments.

It was the reason he’d never gone to his big brother.

There was one thing Negan was right about, and his reaction to John’s story had proven it. If he died before John it was absolutely necessary that everything he ever was or owned be burned to nothing. God forbid the ghost of Negan Winchester rise again.

* * *

Sam looked up from the floor as his dad came into his and brother’s bedroom. He knew he should be grateful that they weren’t being whisked away to some other state, but he wasn’t. He was scared. Scared that his dad would die, and they’d never see him again. Maybe living on the road wasn’t so bad. Maybe he could talk dad into at least taking Dean.

His big brother was sore about how his dad had managed everything. Sam knew that Dean wanted to go with on the hunt, wanted to learn and be a part of the action. But Sam had been so damned sick of packing and going to new schools or just plain missing out on what kids his age were doing, that he’d thrown a temper tantrum the likes of which John and Dean hadn’t seen from him before.

“Hey boys,” John said as he forced a smile. “I know I didn’t give you much of a head’s up, but I’m desperate on this one.”

Dean was paying the utmost attention to their father, no doubt hoping against all hope that John would change his mind and let Dean go with him. Sam wanted to roll his eyes. There was no way Dad was going to do that. Not yet. Not until their dad was no longer so terrified of losing Dean on a hunt.

Especially after what happened during the last salt and burn. He would bet all the spending money he had that Dean would never step out of a protective circle again.

“Why aren’t we with Bobby or Pastor Jim or,” Dean started, but John silenced him when he placed his hand on the younger’s shoulder.

“Jim and Bobby are going with me. This hunt, it’s…” John hesitated and that worried Sam. His dad rarely ever beat around the bush and he was always honest with them. Even if it was cruel or harsh. “Boys, I think I found the demon that took your mother from us, and I need all the help I can get.”

“So why not take your brother if he’s so great?” Dean asked.

John dropped down to sit on the floor with them. Sam wasn’t going to let the opportunity pass him by, so he immediately crawled into his dad’s lap. He was ten. It meant that any day now he’d be too big for that kind of thing. He may have already surpassed that age, but his dad seemed just as reluctant to mention it as Sam was.

“That’s the easiest thing for me to explain in my mind, but the hardest to put in words,” John sighed. He only took a minute or so to formulate an answer for them. “While I trust Bobby and Jim with you boys, while I know they’d both die for you… With Negan? Well, he wouldn’t _have_ to die for you boys because he’s just that good at this kind of thing.”

“Is he strict?” Sam asked, worried about what kind of man Negan must be.

“Very,” John said and pressed a kiss on the top of his head. “He will expect you both to fall in line. He’s not gonna hurt you boys, but you’ll regret crossing him or breaking any rule he lays down.”

Sam noticed how nervous that made his own big brother. Dean was normally very good for their dad, but lately that had changed. Dean was caught sneaking out, playing hooky, and just yesterday he’d been busted drinking a beer.

Their dad had been furious. He’d smacked Dean upside the head and then sent him to their room without dinner. Sam sneaked him a sandwich the moment their dad went to take a shower. Though, Sam kind of thought John knew about it. His dad rarely took showers at night unless it was right after a hunt.

“He seems kind of weird,” he whispered to his dad, hoping to be soothed on the man’s boisterous and loud behavior.

Dean shrugged, unusually quiet about the situation while his dad just chuckled and squeezed him a little tighter.

“He’s always been like that. I think it’s because he was the oldest,” John explained. “He likes to be the center of attention.”

“Kind of like Dean?” he grinned as he watched his brother’s face scrunch up indignantly.

His dad laughed a little more and it was so rare and so nice, that Dean dropped his anger. Sam liked it when their dad was happy, but Dean was desperate for it. He knew his brother would do absolutely anything he could to make his dad laugh or smile.

Maybe Negan was the same way. Maybe that was why he’d talked like that earlier. To get their dad to laugh. He knew it made Dean laugh.

“Yeah, Sammy,” John nodded. “Kind of like Dean.”

* * *

Negan moved silently down the hall and listened in on the conversation. Part of him was thrilled, absolutely ecstatic to see his brother again, meet his nephews, and even be entrusted with their care. The other part though, the part that had been mortified and so fucking hurt by his brother’s abandonment was bitter and enraged.

If there hadn’t been a couple of kids around, Negan might have busted his brother’s jaw just to remind him who the hell he was.

As the father and his sons began to say their goodnights and maybe even goodbyes, Negan moved back to the kitchen. It only took him seconds to find the whiskey in the cabinet above the fridge. He pulled the bottled down and set it on the table before he dug around in his jacket pockets for his pack of smokes. He had a feeling John would give him shit, but he could care less. Still, he turned on the stove top fan and opened the window beside the sink before actually lighting up.

Negan took a drag and, leaving the cigarette to sit between his lips, opened the cupboards until he found a couple of glass tumblers. He set them down on the table beside the whiskey and went about pouring them each a couple fingers.

“By all means, make yourself at home,” John snorted.

“You know, you sure have turned into one ornery sonuvabitch,” Negan rolled his eyes and handed one of the tumblers to his brother. “Take a drink, settle your butt down, and let’s talk.”

“It’s your turn to do the talking.” John grabbed the glass but didn’t immediately drink it. “Yeah, I’ve said what I needed to about that situation.”

“Fair enough,” Negan nodded and then took a long drag off his cigarette before tossing it, only a quarted of the way finished, into the sink.

He should have apologized before ripping into his brother about taking so fucking long to find him. But then, part of him was glad to have something to be angry about with John. Being pissed prevented that miserable ache of failure to protect the man he had mistakenly believed was the very last of his blood relations.

“So, what happened?” John asked. “How’d it go down for you?”

Negan grinned but that was mostly to keep from grimacing. “I was always a player, but you knew that. You and mom knew all about my fuckbuddies. Just like I know that you probably figured I wasn’t faithful to,” he paused, it hurt to speak her name. “to Lucille.” 

John frowned. He looked disappointed of course, but as Negan pointed out, unsurprised by the acknowledgement. Negan wished he’d interrupt, get them on a different subject, but it was going to come out sooner or later. It might as well come out before his brother marched off to face some bad-ass demon with a raging fucking hard-on for John’s little family.

Eew. That… That sounded bad even to him, and Negan could make a joke, _and_ laugh about it, out of anything. Though that wasn’t at all what he’d meant. He cringed and took a shot of the whiskey as if to cleanse his mind of such a poorly thought-out thought.

“You gonna get to the point?” John glared, either impatient or concerned with Negan’s own temporary disgust with himself.

Negan smiled again. “During my first deployment, long before Lucille, I met this skinny little fucker who was gonna get himself killed. The dumb shit didn’t know his balls from his prick, John! You shoulda seen him,” he paused to look at his brother, gaging how angry he was making the man. “That fuckwit was pathetic.”

John snorted and rolled his eyes. Negan could feel the judgement coming off his brother. “You bullied him, didn’t you?”

“Bullied?” Negan gritted his teeth, trying not to lose his temper with his little brother. He closed his eyes and took a deep breath. “No, you fuckhead, I slept with him! I took him under my wing and kept him alive.”

He was pleased at the blush that ran over John’s features.

“Oh, don’t tell me I’ve bruised your delicate sensibilities,” Negan felt the tension of his anger dissipate at the obvious discomfort of John. “Never thought about doing the freaky-deaky with a man before, John?”

John shook his head.

Negan shrugged. To each their own. “Anyhow, during some leave, we’d found an hourly motel to exhaust ourselves in. He heads out after I’m done making him gnaw on his pillow and he just wasn’t right. I had started to gather that things weren’t quite right with him, so I followed. Thought maybe the punk was fuckin’ around on me or some shit.

“He went out to a crossroads, John. A fucking crossroads,” Negan took John’s tumbler and drank the contents since he didn’t seem eager to drink it. “He summoned the sleazy bitch and they started negotiating. He wanted to be a war hero, get a book deal, make some money and he wanted me dead because I’m the one who knew him best. Which was just code for I knew he was cum guzzling coward.

“I didn’t wait to find out if the demon would make the deal,” Negan smirked. “I pulled my side arm and shot him in the chest. Then as I walked over, I grabbed a rock, first one I could find that would suit my purpose. He cried like a fucking bitch as I marched my ass right up to him and ended it. Shattered his fucking skull right in front of that black-eyed piece of shit.

“She said something about offering me anything I wanted, but I spit at her feet and walked my ass back to base. From that night forward, it was like a light switch, John. One minute I had no idea what was hidden in the shadows, the next I could see it all.

“But I didn’t just see the shit, I fucking felt it; made my nuts tighten and my dick shrink every damned time. From that night I knew anytime something inhuman was around and then,” Negan swallowed. “And then I went into a church and there he was. This angelic creature…

“He told me I was out of the running for his vessel. Said I’d murdered a man in cold blood. Didn’t have dick to say about my boning anyone interested, but murdering a man who wanted me dead? That was stretching his scrotum just a little too far apparently.”

John frowned but didn’t speak. Negan’s brother had always been the silent type and he wanted to respect it, but he **_hated_** long silences. Negan didn’t brood. Or at least, he didn’t get quiet around others. He was damned good at reading people regardless of the setting. Besides, half the crap that came out of his mouth pushed people into being themselves. Silence didn’t reveal a fucking thing.

He knew John wasn’t going to ask about why they hadn’t had the discussion sooner. The burn of their last conversation was still smoldering in Negan’s belly. If John had been anyone else, anyone but the little brother Negan spent the majority of his life protecting, he wouldn’t have come out.

Not even for his nephews.

But there _was_ a time. A time when Negan stood strong and taught John everything he needed to know about life, about cars and music, about when to fight honorably and when to fight dirty. He taught him how to treat women and anyone weaker than himself.

Shit, he’d all but raised John.

“I’m sorry you lost Mary,” he whispered as he poured himself and his brother some more whiskey.

He could see John’s eyes water as the man rubbed his face with both hands and nodded. “Thanks, Negan,” he whispered. “I’m sorry about Lucille.”

The silence became sullen and thick. Negan hated it. He slammed back a shot and was pleased when John finally did the same with his own.

“Well now that, _that’s_ over and done with,” Negan snickered as he pulled another cigarette from his hardpack. “I think it’s time you and I discuss your expectations for Sammy and Deano.”


End file.
